poem
Volume 31, Number 2

Bring Back Bees

Our honeybees die en masse again this year.
When a crop dusting plane turns low
overhead, back to a nearby corn field
I shake my fist, curse,
feel small as I do
at each day’s news.

Families imprisoned for seeking freedom,
peace treaties trashed in a charade of strength,
rivers strangled by coal plant effluent.
Everyone I know is past rage now,
sick and weak with shock
as if our hearts can’t take much more.

But your heart and mine keep beating,
bearing blood through bodies seemingly safe
as if we are not one body.
We scroll Instagram, shop, stay in
to watch movies where crises
are resolved in 90 minutes.

Maybe we march, petition, boycott. Maybe
we recycle, vote green. But can we step back
from blame? Our own atriums teach
survival is red and blue.
I want to know we can work together
long enough to bring back the bees.


—Laura Grace Weldon